Old Testament

by

Thursday, 17 July 2014 : 15th Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Isaiah 26 : 7-9, 12, 16-19

Let the righteous walk in righteousness. You make smooth the path of the just, and we only seek the way of Your laws, o YHVH. Your Name and Your memory are the desire of our hearts. My soul yearns for You in the night; for You my spirit keeps vigil. When Your judgments come to earth, the world’s inhabitants learn to be upright.

YHVH, please give us peace; for all that we accomplish is Your work. For they sought You in distress, they cried out to You in the time of their punishment. As a woman in travail moans and writhes in pain, so are we now in Your presence. We conceived, we had labour pains, but we gave birth to the wind. We have not brought salvation to the land; the inhabitants of a new world have not been born.

Your dead will live! Their corpses will rise! Awake and sing, you who lie in the dust! Let Your dew fall, o Lord, like a dew of light, and the earth will throw out her dead.

by

Wednesday, 16 July 2014 : 15th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of our Lady of Mount Carmel (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Marian feasts)

Psalm 93 : 5-6, 7-8, 9-10, 14-15

They crush Your people, o Lord, they oppress Your inheritance. They murder the widow and the lonely, they massacre the helpless.

“The Lord does not see,” they say, “the God of Jacob does not care.” Remember this, you stupid people, when will you understand, you fools!

He who made the ear, will He not hear? He who formed the eye, will He not see? He who rebukes nations, will He not punish them?

The Lord will not reject His people nor will He forsake His heritage. Justice will return to the just, and the upright will follow in its wake.

Alternative reading (Mass of the Blessed Virgin Mary)

Luke 1 : 46-47, 48-49, 50-51, 52-53, 54-55

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit exults in God my Saviour!

He has looked upon His servant in her lowliness, and people forever will call me blessed. The Mighty One has done great things for me, Holy is His Name!

From age to age His mercy extends to those who live in His presence. He has acted with power and done wonders, and scattered the proud with their plans.

He has put down the mighty from their thrones, and lifted up those who are downtrodden. He has filled the hungry with good things, but has sent the rich away empty.

He held out His hand to Israel, His servant, for He remembered His mercy, even as He promised to our fathers, to Abraham and his descendants forever.

by

Wednesday, 16 July 2014 : 15th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of our Lady of Mount Carmel (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Marian feasts)

Isaiah 10 : 5-7, 13-16

Woe to Assyria, the rod of My anger, the staff of My fury! Against a godless nation I send him, against a people who provoke My wrath I dispatch him, to plunder and pillage, to tread them down like mud in the streets. But the mind of his king is far from this, his heart harbours other thoughts; what he wants is to destroy, to make an end of all nations.

For the king says : “By my own strength I have done this and by my own wisdom, for I am clever. I have moved the frontiers of peoples, I have plundered treasures, I have brought inhabitants down to the dust, I have toppled kings from their thrones.”

“As one reaches into a nest, so my hands have reached into nations’ wealth. As one gathers deserted eggs, so have I gathered the riches of the earth. No one flapped a wing or opened its mouth to chirp a protest.”

“Does the axe claim more credit than the man who wields it? Does the saw magnify itself more than the one who uses it? This would be like a rod wielding the man who lifts it up; will those not made of wood, be controlled by the cudgel? Therefore the Lord, YHVH Sabaoth, is ready to send a wasting sickness upon the king’s sturdy warriors. Beneath His plenty, a flame will burn like a consuming fire.

Alternative reading (Mass of the Blessed Virgin Mary)

Zechariah 2 : 14-17

“Sing and rejoice, o daughter of Zion, for I am about to come, I shall dwell among you,” says YHVH. “On that day, many nations will join YHVH and be My people, but My dwelling is among you.”

The people of Judah will be for YHVH as His portion in His holy land. He will choose Jerusalem again. Keep still in YHVH’s presence, for He comes, having risen from His holy dwelling.

by

Tuesday, 15 July 2014 : 15th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Bonaventure, Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 47 : 2-3a, 3b-4, 5-6, 7-8

Great is the Lord, most worthy of praise in the city of God, His holy mountain. Beautifully elevated, it is the joy of all the earth.

Mount Zion, heavenly mountain, the city of the great King. Here within her lines of defense, God has shown Himself to be a sure fortress.

The kings assembled together, advanced toward the city. But as soon as they saw it, they were astounded; they panicked and took to flight.

Seized with fear, they trembled, like a woman in travail, or like the ships of Tarshish, shattered by a strong wind from the east.

by

Tuesday, 15 July 2014 : 15th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Bonaventure, Bishop and Doctor of the Church (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Isaiah 7 : 1-9

When Ahaz son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, was king of Judah, king Rezin of Aram and Pekah son of Remaliah, king of Israel, laid siege to Jerusalem but they were unable to capture it.

When the news reached the house of David, “Aram’s troops are encamped in Ephraim,” the heart of the king and the hearts of the people trembled as the trees of the forest tremble before the wind.

YHVH then said to Isaiah : “Go with your sin A-remnant-will-return, and meet Ahaz at the end of the aqueduct of the Upper Pool, on the road to the Washerman’s Field. Say to him, “Stay calm and fear not; do not lose courage before these two stumps of smoldering firebrands – the fierce anger of Rezin the Aramean and the blazing fury of the son of Remaliah.”

“You know that Aram, Ephraim and Remaliah’s son have plotted against Judah, saying : Let us invade and scare it, let us seize it and put the son of Tabeel king over it. But the Lord YHVH says : It shall not be so, it shall not come to pass. For Damascus is only the head of Aram and Rezin the lord of Damascus. Samaria is only the head of Ephraim and Remaliah’s son is only the lord of Samaria.”

“Within fifty-six years, Ephraim will be shattered and will no longer be a people. But if you do not stand firm in faith, you, too will not stand at all.”

by

Monday, 14 July 2014 : 15th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Camillus de Lellis, Priest (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 49 : 8-9, 16bc-17, 21 and 23

Not for your sacrifices do I reprove you, for your burnt offerings are ever before Me. I need no bull from your stalls, nor he-goat from your pens.

What right have you to mouth My laws, or to talk about My covenant? You hate My commands and cast My words behind you.

Because I was silent while you did these things, you thought I was like you. But now I rebuke you and make this charge against you. Those who give with thanks offerings honour Me, but the one who walks blamelessly, I will show him the salvation of God.

by

Sunday, 13 July 2014 : 15th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Bible Sunday (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 64 : 10abcd, 10e-11, 12-13, 14

You water the land and care for it, enriching it with natural resources. God’s stream is filled with water.

So You prepare the earth to give us its fruits. You drench the furrows in the land and level the ridges, You soften the soil with showers and bless its crops.

You crown the year with Your goodness; abundance flows everywhere. The deserts have become pasture land, the hills are clothed with gladness.

The meadows covered with flocks, the valleys decked with grain – they shout and sing for joy.

by

Sunday, 13 July 2014 : 15th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Bible Sunday (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Isaiah 55 : 10-11

As the rain and the snow come down from the heavens and do not return till they have watered the earth, making it yield seed for the sower and food for others to eat, so is My Word that goes forth out of My mouth : It will not return to Me idle, but It shall accomplish My will, the purpose for which It has been sent.

by

Saturday, 12 July 2014 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Saturday Mass of our Lady)

Psalm 92 : 1ab, 1c-2, 5

The Lord reigns, robed in majesty; the Lord is girded with strength.

The world now is firm, it cannot be moved. Your throne stands from long ago, o Lord, from all eternity You are.

Your decrees can be trusted; holiness dwells in Your house day after day without end, o Lord.

by

Saturday, 12 July 2014 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Saturday Mass of our Lady)

Isaiah 6 : 1-8

In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted; the train of His robe filled the Temple. Above Him were seraphs, each with six wings : two to cover the face, two to cover the feet, and two to fly with.

They were calling to one another : “Holy, Holy, Holy is YHVH Sabaoth. All the earth is filled with His Glory!” At the sound of their voices the foundations of the threshold shook and the Temple was filled with smoke.

I said, “Poor me! I am doomed! For I am a man of unclean lips living among a people of unclean lips, and yet I have seen the King, YHVH Sabaoth.” Then one of the seraphs flew to me; in his hands was a live coal which he had taken with tongs from the altar. He touched my mouth with it and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin is forgiven.”

Then I heard the voice of the Lord, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” I answered, “Here I am. Send me!”